


blue lips aint healthy babe - (unfinished work)

by mollusk



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Dissociation, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Gen, Mental Instability, Surgery, Time Travel, possible interpretation could be, sat around in my WIPs folder for like a year
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-03
Updated: 2018-08-03
Packaged: 2019-06-21 10:33:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15555825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mollusk/pseuds/mollusk
Summary: "She’s been here forever. She’s just entered, never left, stayed for millennia, all at once. Her name- what is a name? -lost in the chaos. From the back of her mind a billion quiet voices scream at her to focus, focus lena, we’re going down she’s gone she’s gone you killed him amelie cheers love the cavalry’s hereSuddenly, it stops."--unfinished thing thats been sitting in my WIPs folder for a while, figured i might as well post it





	blue lips aint healthy babe - (unfinished work)

**Author's Note:**

> check me out on tumblr @ monetarymollusk  
> thanks 2 snake for tellin me 2 post this also ;P

Falling.

 

Falling.

 

Flashes of blue spark past her vision, glittering like long-forgotten stars as she plummets. Below her the world shifts endlessly, forming and reforming with the passage of time. Scenes pass, stirring up vague memories of her life before  _ this _ . A child’s birthday party, an apocalyptic warzone, a lone bastion unit decaying in a forest- it goes by in a blur. Dimly, she recognizes the faces of her friends as they flit past. A tear drips down her face.

 

She’s been here forever. She’s just entered, never left, stayed for millennia, all at once. Her name- what is a name? -lost in the chaos. From the back of her mind a billion quiet voices scream at her to  _ focus, focus lena, we’re going down she’s gone she’s gone you killed him amelie cheers love the cavalry’s here _

 

Suddenly, it stops. Around her is the vast emptiness of the universe, unending and unforgiving. Lena can’t remember the last time it stopped for this long (not that she remembers much anyhow) but relishes in the quiet expanse of space, a brief respite from the constant  _ shift _ . Below her, the Earth crumbles into dust.

 

Just as she registers the serenity she’s off again. This time, she stands in the middle of a flaming battlefield, watching a child scream for their mother, clawing at a pile of rubble with bleeding hands. Their tears steam off in the unbearable heat, but all Tracer feels is cold. The child’s head whips towards her in anguish, shrieking at her for help. Held up by bloodied stumps where their legs used to be they begin to crawl toward her, wailing in agony. 

 

Tracer, thrust into awareness with violent clarity, stumbles towards them. Moving after this long is near impossible, but she manages to stagger her way close enough to touch.

 

Her hand passes right through them. 

 

A blink and she’s gone. The image of their burnt face flashes in her mind, overriding the landscapes flitting by. How it felt when she passed through them, shining with fresh tears and blood and dirt and  _ fear _ . 

 

She’s never been seen before. Lena’s non-existent stomach lurches at the thought of it. A quiet voice in the back of her mind whispers horrible things. 

 

_ we could be free _

 

_ we could see everyone again _

 

_ it’s stopping _

 

Tracer curls into a ball, grinding her teeth. Time falls around her, unnoticed in her turmoil. Again, she lands with a _ thump  _ onto solid ground. Stretching all around her is a beautiful grassy field, dotted with clover and flowers. Birds glide across the sky, unaware of the girl below them.

 

Tracer shudders despite herself. The scene should be beautiful, but all she can feel is icy terror dripping its way down her spine. Her gloved hands-  _ she has hands now, doesn't she? _ \- tear up clumps of grass and dirt. Shakily, she lifts one shaking hand up to her face, eyes wide. She’s- Lena was  _ solid. _

 

It’s gone again.

 

This continues for  _ monthsdaysyearsdecadesmillenia _ without change. She’ll be falling through time, watching the world come and go, live and die, endless. It was- for lack of a better word- normalcy. Every so often, something would shake things up. Tracer would see Angela again, Winston, her  _ mother- _ all crying for someone she did not know. Occasionally they would see her, scream for her to  _ come back you can hold on  _

 

In the back of her mind, Tracer loathes them.

 

A quiet library, a whirlpool in an ocean, a litter of kittens huddled under a blanket. Her own living room, over and over and  _ over _ . Everything passes by without notice.

 

With a snap, Tracer lands. The impact makes her shudder in pain, sensation coming in waves. The people around her are dark blurs, obscured by tears. In the back of her mind she hears someone screaming. She thrashes wildly, limbs glancing off of the objects around her. Somewhere, the unmistakable voice of Angela barks out an order in rapid German.

 

_ “Lena! Calm down honey, we have you! Scheisse, she’s-”  _ Tracer’s back arches in agony, mouth stretched to the point of pain as she screams. Her arms, painfully solid, are held down by strong hands she cannot see. She can’t see  _ anything _ \- blue sparks completely obscuring her vision as she writhes. It burns like nothing she’s felt before, nothing she will ever feel again. The shift is back, clawing at her with inhuman force, but still she stays.  _ Why is she staying?  _ Something is holding her back and it  _ hurts-  _ consuming every sensation.

 

_ “Lena,hold still- keep her down! This is going to hurt, I’m so sorry-” _

  
  


White hot agony carves itself in a line at the center of her chest. If Tracer could shriek any louder she would, but at this point the pain is doubled as she nearly shreds her vocal chords. In the absence of her screaming, tears stream down her face, both in pain and fear. Angela shushes her quietly as she works, hands flitting to cut away the remains of Tracer’s flight uniform. Her head falls to the side of the makeshift operating table, and from this new perspective she spots Winston. The scientist is huddled in the corner of the room, almost comically large in the metal chair he sits upon. In his fidgeting hands he holds a large harness, glowing the same blue as her sparks. It pulses softly in time with her pain, which is fading slightly as she registers more of her surroundings. A sterile hospital room, lights glinting in her eyes like the sun. In front of her Angela is carving into her chest with a scalpel, trying to catch her attention. 

 

(From the back of her mind, Lena wonders how she hasn’t passed out yet.)

 

“Lena,  _ liebling _ , look at me. You need to stay with me, I’m so sorry, there's no time for the anaesthetic to kick in; you just need to stay awake,” Angela says, shifting to the side now to grab at another glowing plate, “It’s almost done.” The cool of the metal nearly burns against Lena’s heated skin - and at this point, she realises,  _ bone  _ \- but… The shift stops. As soon as it touches her. The pain is still there,  _ God _ is it still there, but the feeling of  _ falling _ just… disappears. If she still could she would sob with joy.

 

“Winston- here! It’s stabilizing, quickly, make sure it’s in correctly, I need to do the stitching,” the doctor yells, backing away slightly to allow the scientist room to see. He looks almost pained as he shuffles up to look- Lena has to assume she’s a bloody mess at this point. Like one of those frogs she had to dissect in high school. The thought would have made her giggle, at one point. Now she just croaks in Winston’s direction.

 

“Looks good- erm, correct I mean. Is she… still in pain?” Winston asks, standing back again while Angela returns and swabs at her wound. The sting of the antiseptic is a pinch in comparison to the pain still radiating through her chest; but she has no way to express it anymore, so she elects to stay silent. That fact that Lena is still  _ here _ is astounding to her. She’d- Tracer’s whole  _ existence _ had narrowed down to that  _ shift _ , and now… the feeling of stability, however comforting it would have been when this whole ordeal had started, fills her with terror.

 

Angela coos gently at her, wiping a tear off of her cheek. The last thing she registers in that cold, sterile room is a prick in her arm, the feeling of ice washing up her veins, and then black.

***

 

The room they keep her in now is nice enough, she supposes. Padded walls, enough books to fill a small library, and the lights were cycled to imitate sunrise and sunset. Of course, there were no windows, just the grey walls and grey floor and grey Tracer. The first night she woke up, she’d screamed with her freshly healed vocal chords and clawed at her own chest until men in armored suits came in to hold her down. Her hands are kept in gloves now.

 

Winston visits often. Three times a day, with her meals. He talks to her about inconsequential things at first, afraid for a reason she could not understand. He calls her Lena, and watches her eat, and does not comment when she starts to cry without warning. Once, he had touched her with one of his large furry hands and she had almost struck him in her surprise.

 

“Oh, I’m so sorry, I should have asked-” he stuttered, hands held up in what was probably intended as a placating gesture. She had flinched backwards, skittering back on still-unsteady legs until her back hit the wall. Eyes wide, breathing labored and uneven - she must have looked like a wild animal.

 

The pity in his eyes made Tracer want to vomit.

 

***

 

Angela is coming to visit today. Winston had told Tracer about this over breakfast - runny eggs and wet toast, all tasting like ash in her mouth. It’s been three weeks.

 

“From what I understand it will be to run some simple medical tests, see how your Stabilizer is reacting to the rest of your body, troubleshoot any side effects. Nothing too invasive,” he explained, eyes not meeting hers. She looked up from her plate, confusion written on her face. Angela never came. Not once. The thought made her stomach turn in anxiety, but instead of Tracer answering in the negative like she intended, Lena’s raspy voice responded.

 

“I would.. Like that. Miss her,” her voice was so damaged and rusty from misuse that it came out as a near whisper. Winston’s face lit up in a wide smile, eyes crinkling around the edges.

 

“Wonderful! When would you like her to come over? I’ll let her team know,” he responded. The digital clock on the wall, glaring bright red  _ (notblueneverblueneveragain)  _ in her periphery, felt more imposing than it ever had.

 

“Three o’clock,” the smile Lena gave in return was shaky, and inside Tracer fumed.

**Author's Note:**

> there we have it ! sorry it ends at such a weird spot. i never could figure out where the fuck i wanted this to go lmao. like comment and subscribe, thanks for reading gamers


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